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Chapter 26
Birkenau, 20 September 1944
MOST DAYS, I felt as if I’d lived a thousand lifetimes in the camp. Others, it was as if my life were somehow frozen in time and, if I could emerge beyond the barbed-wire fences, perhaps I’d return as that fourteen-year-old girl with a loving family in Warsaw and girlish whims of chess championships.
By the fall of 1944, a new year was approaching and would bring my eighteenth birthday, an unusual and foreign realization because each passing year felt no different from the last. If not for the war, I would have been preparing to attend a university, maybe to study accounting like my father or social work like my mother. My siblings would have been clumsy adolescents, and we would have teased my parents about the streaks of gray creeping into their hair. I would have met friends in cafés and spent romantic evenings at the ballet with a handsome young man by my side. I’d have been a young woman by all measures. Instead my story was a different one.
As I left my block one September morning and readjusted my headscarf, I spotted a Jewish woman lingering outside the building. After making sure the guards weren’t looking, I hurried to meet her.
“You know, Maria, if you’d ever like to transfer back to the Union Munitions Factory, we can arrange it,” she said by way of greeting.
“You’re the ones smuggling the gunpowder, not me,” I replied with a smile. “All I did was work there for a time to lend my support.”
“Which we appreciate, because we need those hiding it in the camp just as much as we need smugglers. But this time, instead of bringing you a capsule, I brought this.” She pressed a slip of paper into my palm, then we parted ways.
As I followed the kitchen kommando to my work detail, I clung to the tiny scrap, certain that I knew who had sent it. When the guards were distracted, I stole a peek at the paper, which contained two hastily scrawled words.
Front lines.
According to the date, Mateusz had written the note a few months prior, which meant he’d had some difficulty getting it to me. As he’d said, Pszczyna wasn’t far, but he sent or received letters only when he visited his parents’ bakery, so our exchanges had been infrequent. Although he hadn’t brought me many updates when we’d worked together, his presence had been a comfort, and I always knew he’d pass word along as soon as he received it.
I closed my hand around the paper and tucked it into my pocket. Anyone else would have been thrilled to hear that Fritzsch had been sent to the front lines. Not me. Had he been imprisoned, getting in touch with him would have been difficult but not impossible. He would have stayed in one place. Now his location was subject to constant change, and my plan to go to Flossenbürg after liberation was ruined.
Fritzsch couldn’t fall in battle. Not before I’d had my say.
When we reached the kitchen, I assumed my place at the sink to prepare for dishwashing, my typical morning assignment. I plunged my arms into hot soapy water, cleaning the ladles and large cauldrons that served our meager soup. If I blocked out the supervisors cursing and demanding we work faster, I could almost imagine I was washing dishes at home.
I was vigorously scrubbing a cauldron when a firm hand grabbed my collar and pulled me backward. Sometimes even my best efforts weren’t enough to escape a guard’s wrath. As I tensed and took a gasping breath, a contemptuous voice met my ears.
“You’re not working very hard.”
When the guard released me, I didn’t turn around, but something in her voice sparked my curiosity. It sounded familiar. She must have yelled at me before. The insults, curses, and slurs came from so many people that they started to run together.
A shove against my shoulder indicated the guard wasn’t finished with me. “Stupid bitch, look at me when I’m talking to you.”
Drying my hands on a dirty dish towel, I obeyed, and the sight before my eyes made me clutch the countertop for support.
She was an SS guard I hadn’t met, and her resemblance to Irena Sienkiewicz was uncanny. If Irena had lived to see her twentieth birthday, she would have looked like this woman—near twenty herself, with Irena’s tall, thin frame, angular features, and bright eyes, but blond hair beneath her cap. If I hadn’t known better . . .
Stop, it’s impossible, I told myself. Irena is dead. Shot and killed two years ago along with her unborn child.
This woman’s voice sounded familiar because it sounded like Irena’s. A new guard who resembled my friend in appearance and speech. What a cruel irony. A daily reminder of my grief.
“Do you have anything to fucking say for yourself?”
The guard had Irena’s mouth, too.
I looked into her eyes and found something behind the cruelty, something I couldn’t place, but I dismissed it. It was all in my head. This woman was my enemy, not my dead friend.
“Forgive me, Frau Aufseherin,” I murmured; then I faced the cauldron and resumed cleaning.
She grabbed my shoulder and spun me around again. It seemed I was doing everything wrong around this guard. “Did I say I was finished with you?” she asked.
“No, Frau—”
“Shut the hell up! Dammit, 16671.”
And that was when I knew.
It was Irena.
It wasn’t, it couldn’t be, but the more I told myself I was wrong the more every wit and sense and fiber of my being told me I was right. Irena had survived. I didn’t know how, but I didn’t care because she was alive and she was masquerading as a camp guard. I looked into her eyes again and identified what I couldn’t place before. Annoyance that I hadn’t recognized her, then annoyance replaced by satisfaction.
We both knew exactly what needed to be done.
“You’re not dismissed until I say so, is that clear?” Irena asked.
“Clear, Frau Aufseherin, and if you’ll be so kind as to dismiss me, I have work to do,” I replied, making sure I was loud enough for my kapo to hear.
At once, Irena grabbed my arm, sneering something about teaching my defiant ass a lesson, and ushered me past my kapo, who darted out of the way. I stumbled along beside her, too dazed to focus on where she was taking me, but, when we passed through a familiar gate and courtyard, I realized our destination. Block 25. Earlier, I’d overheard a guard saying Block 25 had been emptied, so Irena must have been privy to the same knowledge.
Inside, the bunks were vacant, but Irena kept her firm grip on me while she looked around. Once satisfied, she released me, and I fell away in disbelief.
“It took you long enough to recognize me,” she said, seeming unfazed by my incredulity.
“How?” I whispered. “I heard the gunshots.”
“They must have been someone else’s. After I said goodbye to you, I went to the courtyard, where a guard said he’d been ordered to take me elsewhere for execution. He took me to a storeroom instead, gave me civilian clothing, put me in a car, and drove me out of the camp. The Polish resistance had gotten word to its camp contacts that I was coming, so they bribed him into saving me.”
As Irena mentioned the camp’s resistance, my heart swelled with sudden gratitude. Pilecki. His organization had saved her life.
Irena adjusted her black leather gloves and lifted her gaze to mine. “After we discovered your family had been caught, Mama and I spent weeks trying to determine how to bribe a Pawiak guard to break you out. By the time we found one willing to help, he said you’d been sent away. We thought they’d taken you somewhere and killed you, otherwise we would have kept looking.” She paused and took a breath. “When the guard fetched me from the execution wall and said he was letting me go, I begged him to go back for you, but he said that wasn’t part of the plan and if I didn’t leave right away then he’d shoot me, and I . . .” She let her voice die, but she wrapped one arm across her midsection. I could picture it as round as it had been upon our last meeting.
“Your baby?” I murmured.
Those words brought a fond smile to Irena’s lips. “Helena is a happy, healt
hy two-year-old. After she was born, I contacted our German resistance connections, and they taught me how to masquerade as a guard. I learned all the Nazi shit I needed to know, got the right papers, perfected my German accent, dyed my hair, and put on this damn uniform. Since you’d reported my death to Mama and stayed in touch with her, I knew you were still alive, but we decided it would be safer if you didn’t know I survived. When I went to a Nazi women’s organization to volunteer for camp employment, our contacts and a few well-placed bribes ensured I was sent to this one. Now here I am: Frieda Lichtenberg, daughter of dairy workers in Wrechen, a few years of primary education, staunch member of the Bund Deutscher Mädel, Aufseherin of Auschwitz-Birkenau.”
Months of studying and preparation to infiltrate the SS-Helferin as a woman created by the Third Reich, and she had somehow succeeded. My brain felt as if it were trudging through mud. “If you survived and escaped, why are you back?”
“Why the hell do you think? Because I’m getting you out of here, you idiot.”
Of course that was why she had come back, but I could hardly believe what I’d heard. She came back to save my life. To give me a chance at freedom. Freedom. A sudden, fierce yearning filled me to the depths of my being, but I shook my head in refusal.
“No, you have to go before you’re caught. Go back to your mother and daughter. I won’t let you risk your life—”
“You don’t have a choice, because I’m already here, and there’s not a damn thing you can do to make me leave. Especially not after all the shit I went through to get here. But speaking of my family, I need you to promise me something.”
I opened my mouth to ask what it was, but the look on Irena’s face made the query catch in my throat. A cold terror settled in the pit of my stomach, and I wanted to beg her to remain silent. Voicing it made it real.
“Mama and Helena are staying in Mother Matylda’s orphanage in Ostrówek,” Irena said. “Our Home Army contacts wanted Mama to stay in Warsaw to help with their planned uprising, but we agreed leaving was necessary to protect Helena. They got out a week before the uprising began, and thank God they did. After what those Nazi bastards have done in the Mokotów district alone, I know exactly what happened to a middle-aged woman and child. Now you know where to find them if necessary, which brings me to the promise I mentioned.” At this, her voice wavered, so she paused for a moment. “If I’m discovered, you’ll tell Mama. You’ll look after her. And you’ll adopt my daughter.”
I’d expected the implications behind those words, but to say yes was to acknowledge a possibility too devastating to fathom, and I shook my head. “I can’t—”
“Dammit, Maria, don’t fight me on this.”
Irena fell into expectant silence. Of course I’d do it, but I didn’t trust myself to speak, so I dipped my head in assent. Suddenly my chest ached as it had in the railcar with my father, nodding as he reassured me after I apologized for what I had caused, though none of us yet knew the extent of the damage I’d done. Despite drawing constant comfort from Father Kolbe, and then his rosary, and resolving to fight for my life, neither had eradicated the truth. My failure had led to my family’s deaths; now one of my dearest friends was here on my behalf. Another life to potentially be lost for my sake.
I was faintly aware of Irena saying something about bringing me food later and smuggling me back to my block; then she started toward the door. As she turned, I grabbed her arm.
“Listen to me. You can’t do this, Irena. I’ve already lost everyone I love, and I won’t lose you, too. Not a second time.”
There was an unusual amount of emotion in her resilient gaze, but, when she spoke, her voice remained level and unyielding. “Then we’d better make damn sure we both get out of here alive.”
I’d dreamt of freedom for so long. I’d promised myself I would attain it; I’d lived and fought for it, for myself and my family and Father Kolbe, but now I dared to believe it could happen. Something rolled down my cheek, and I touched it. A single tear. I stared at the moisture against my dirty fingertip. My fingernail was cracked and broken, skin torn and calloused, each groove and crevice coated in grime, yet there it was, the first droplet in years, sitting atop the filth, clear and pristine.
“Good Lord.”
I hadn’t realized how badly I’d missed hearing Irena’s favorite complaint, and I laughed and blinked back the tears. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know what to say.”
“You should be cursing your bad luck, because Frieda Lichtenberg has officially made Prisoner 16671 her target. And Frieda is a real bitch.”
Unable to speak, I pulled her into a tight embrace, and she wrapped long arms around my emaciated frame. It took me only a moment to remember that I was filthy beyond comprehension and covered in lice, fleas, and God knew what else. I hastily released her and stepped away.
Surely Irena knew why I was hesitating. But she guided me back into her arms.
It was the first time I’d embraced anyone other than Hania in more than two years. The last time had also been Irena. Right before her intended execution.
My body was starving, yet my soul was starving even more. Starving for kindness, compassion, love, everything I once took for granted. Raw hunger never ceased to gnaw at me, but the hunger for human affection was a sharp ache that pierced me to the depths of my being. One simple gesture was all it took to alleviate the agony. And in this moment, this one moment, the hunger within my soul was satiated.
* * *
No prisoners were transferred to Block 25 all day, so I spent my time alone and attempted to comprehend what had happened. Irena was alive. She had a daughter. And she was risking everything to help me escape.
She slipped me some bread and sausage at lunchtime—food from the SS supply, a rare delicacy—but she didn’t linger. Seeing her a second time was enough to remind me that the day’s events had been real.
When the workday ended, I sat on a bunk and peered through the bars on the window, watching as the women returned to camp. I stayed there until the door burst open, then I flipped onto my stomach, praying I’d remain undetected.
“Maria? Maria, where are you? First Izaak was transferred to the Sonderkommando, and now this—”
At the sound of the familiar, frantic whisper, I stuck my head out so Hania noticed me, and relief washed over her face. “Oy gevalt, shikse, I was so worried. I came as soon as I heard.”
I quickly climbed down from the bunk. “Izaak was transferred to the Sonderkommando?” I asked as she reached me. The name tasted of ash on my tongue. Those prisoners were condemned to work in the gas chambers and crematoria and forbidden to interact with others—and frequently liquidated to prevent them from revealing the horrors they saw. If the work was so awful that the rest of us were not permitted to know details, I couldn’t fathom what the Sonderkommando was required do.
“I was in the central office and saw the work record of inmates reassigned to Crematorium II, and his number was among them,” Hania said. “Oh, and these are for you.”
I opened my hand, suspecting what she’d brought. She pulled two small gunpowder capsules out of her mouth, smuggled to her from other resistance members who had gotten them from the women in the munitions factory. I’d pass them on to a woman in the clothing detail, another person in our long, complex chain. When the time to fight came, we’d be ready.
I grimaced as she dropped the wet capsules into my palm. “I always appreciate when you carry these in your mouth.”
“There are worse places.” A teasing grin accompanied the words while I tucked the capsules into my pocket, then it disappeared. “Here we are going on and on when we don’t have time to waste. I’ll get you out of here, I promise—”
The door swung open, cutting her words short. Gasping, she whirled toward the sound, and Irena stepped across the threshold.
At once, Hania moved in front of me. She would attempt a deal, as any prisoner might in such a desperate situation. To survive in this place was to depend on what
others were willing to give in return. One prisoner might offer cigarettes for another’s medication. A kapo might grant a woman a morsel of bread in exchange for a quick favor—the kind that took place behind the block or in the darkened barracks after curfew. As for bartering with the guards, even a request for a life might be granted for a suitable price.
I had no time to tell Hania that negotiations would not be necessary; she was already speaking, her tone filled with the confidence and determination she always adopted in these instances.
“Frau Aufseherin, in exchange for her release, I—” And then her voice broke, shattering her usual resolve as if her intended proposal had fled. Silence fell, broken only by a distant guard’s faint shout, before she went on in an unsteady whisper. “Please.”
Irena appeared too stricken to respond while I swallowed the sudden lump in my throat. I placed a hand on Hania’s forearm. She glanced at me, her eyes dark with fear, desperation, as though unable to fathom two devastating blows—her brother’s reassignment, then my supposed imprisonment. With a small, reassuring smile, I gave her an appreciative squeeze before stepping forward to address Irena.
“We can trust Hania.”
Hania spun me around to face her. “You know a guard working both sides?”
“Not exactly,” I said with a laugh. “Meet Irena.”
At this, she looked at me as if I’d truly gone mad. “Your dead friend?”
“Right, I’m a fucking ghost. Can we go?” Irena moved toward the door; when I tried to follow, Hania caught my forearm.
“It’s been over three years since you’ve worked together,” she said, voice low, wary gaze on Irena’s turned back. “She comes here as if to die for the resistance, then returns as part of the SS-Helferin?”
Before I could explain or dispute her concerns, Irena came to an abrupt stop by the window. “Shit.”
A few guards crossed the courtyard with a group of prisoners, women who would remain in Block 25 until they were sent to the gas chambers. And if Hania and I didn’t have a convincing reason to leave, we’d be joining them. Despite the imminent danger, an old, familiar thrill pulsed through me, and I imagined walking down the streets of Warsaw with Irena. Two resistance girls outwitting the Nazis. It was time for us to be those girls again.
The Last Checkmate Page 22